


...and i will write you a sonnet

by AngelicSentinel



Category: Mass Effect
Genre: Bad Poety, Concrete Poetry, F/M, Flash Fic, Fluff, Free Verse, Prose fic with character written poetry inside, Teasing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-18
Updated: 2015-05-13
Packaged: 2018-01-25 14:14:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,191
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1651559
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AngelicSentinel/pseuds/AngelicSentinel
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Quiet moments in the middle of the war.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Heart -- Concrete Poetry

Shepard scribbled furiously on a sheet of paper at her desk. The hamster chittered behind her, almost urging her on. Every now and then she’d stop to chew on top of her pen. Balls of papers littered the desk. She’d been at it for some time when the whoosh of the door to her quarters alerted her to a new presence.

She turned her head. “Garrus?”

“Hey Shepard.”

She pushed back her chair and stood, stretching to get the kinks out. She’d been sitting a long time. She put her fingers together and cracked them, shaking out the cramps. “Hey yourself. What are you doing here?”

“I came by to check on you,” Garrus said. “You missed dinner.”

Shepard blinked. She glanced at her omnitool and groaned when she realized it was Delta shift. “Didn’t realize so much time had passed already.”

“What are you working on?” asked Garrus, peering over her shoulder. 

Shepard blushed, red tinting her swarthy skin. She scrabbled for the papers, trying pick them up in a hurry, knocking one to the ground in her haste. “It’s not finished yet,” she mumbled.

“I take it it’s not something work-related?” Garrus’s mandibles twitched up in a smile.

“Not as such, no,” Shepard said. She cleared her throat. “So yeah.”

Garrus leaned down, picking up the solitary paper that had escaped her grasp. Shepard dropped her other papers and leapt for it, missing as Garrus turned and read it with his back to her. Scribbles marked the surface and she’d crossed much of the writing out. His omnitool’s language processors translated it to turian script easily.
    
    
    Blue              eyes,  
    
    Silver plates shining in the sun,  
    
    Ruthless grace, the gleam of a rifle,  
    
    The sound of thunder on the field—two  
    
    Hearts beat in timeless rhythm.  
    
    
    Perfection. 

“Is that in the shape of the human concept of a heart?” Garrus said. “That was in the vids.”

“Yeah,” said Shepard, rubbing the back of her neck. “It’s not done,” she repeated.

Garrus tilted his head down and stared at her. Shepard shifted from foot to foot. “You wrote me poetry.”

“Yeah,” Shepard said again. She wrung her hands. “You liked it?” She looked up at him from underneath her eyelashes.

“Yeah.” Garrus said. “Definitely. Is that what all these are?” He gestured to the papers spread haphazardly across the floor.

Shepard grimaced. “Attempts.”

Garrus leaned down and touched his forehead to hers. “Thank you.”


	2. Roses are Red...

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Garrus attempts to pen a poem in response.

"Garrus?" The turian heard his name over the the loudspeaker. He looked up from his reports, happy at the distraction from his work for once. The numbers were grim.

"EDI?" He asked. "That you?"

"Yes. You asked to be notified whenever a major human holiday was about to take place. I just wanted to inform you that Saint Valentine's Day is on the Fourteenth. That is three days away."

"Valentine's Day? What kind of holiday is it?" It _had_ come up in the vids, but he didn't quite remember.

A brief pause. "It is a holiday centered around lovers."

"Lovers?" Garrus said doubtfully, his stomach churning. Surely Shepard didn't expect him to...

"The origin dates back over a thousand years, and the eponymous saint could be one of several by that name, starting from 167 CE. However, the trend seems to come from one legend that cannot be verified historically. A priest appears to have been imprisoned for marrying young lovers against the policy of the state. Popular legend states as he was about to die, he wrote a letter to the daughter of his jailor."

"What does that have to do with anything?"

"It was the first 'Valentine,'" EDI said. "Now each year on that day, humans send each other candy, flowers, and greeting cards. Poetry and jewelry are also common."

"Humans are strange," Garrus said.

"Although I was coded by them, I happen to agree," said EDI.

He perked up. "Wait a second. Did you say poetry?"

"I did. Humans write it often in their Valentines. The most popular variation appears to be:
    
    
    Roses are red,  
    
    Violets are blue,  
    
    Sugar is sweet,  
    
    And so are you."

"That seems simple enough," Garrus said. "Thanks, EDI."

"You are welcome," she said.

_Hmm. Shepard didn't like sugar, though._ Garrus waited for a moment before turning and pacing his way down the length of the battery. Turians really didn't do poetry, not in the sense that humans and the asari did. Turian art was both functional and pragmatic. It had to have a use and be more than just pretty. Everything a turian did was for the betterment of society as a whole, and art was no exception. Not to say they didn't have it, no, but other species didn't often realize their art _was_ art. Art for art's sake didn't exist for them, not the way it did for alien species. Garrus's first introduction to poetry had been the Civic Duties written in verse. It was easier to remember that way.

So when it came to human poetry, Garrus was more than a bit bewildered. Shepard writing him a poem had surprised him. He'd never really seen her as the type, though he knew she loved to read. He had no idea what to do for this. Shepard hadn't hinted at the holiday at all, hadn't acknowledged it in any fashion. 

Still, three days later had him walking up to her cabin, extremely nervous. She perched over her desk, writing an After Action report.

She turned to him, smiling. "Garrus, wha—"

He took a deep breath and shoved the box in his hands towards her.

"Garrus, what is this?" she said, turning the large box over in her hands.

Happyvalentinesday," he muttered, neck coloring.

"Oh!" she said, a little breathless as she opened it.

A small box of truffles, given to him by Liara when he asked about it with a shake of her head and a wink and a nudge. There were no fresh flowers on a ship, and he had no time to order any, so he had made some out of paper from a tutorial he'd found on the extranet, and bundled it together in a makeshift bouquet. And last but not least— 

She picked up the card he'd made, the human writing he'd mimicked on the outside large and cartoonish. She flipped it open and read it aloud:
    
    
    "Roses are red,  
    
    Your hair is red, too,  
    
    You shoot pretty good,  
    
    But I shoot better than you."

Shepard bit her lip and looked down, not meeting Garrus's eyes.

Garrus was on edge. Shepard was shaking. "Shepard?" Garrus asked tentatively.

She burst out laughing, wrapping her arms around Garrus and kissing him on the mouth. "This is the best Valentine I think I've ever received," she said, still laughing. "Normally, I don't like greeting card holidays, but this is awesome. How'd you even find out about this?"

"EDI," Garrus said, wrapping his arms around her.

"I should have known," Shepard said, shaking her head and leaning against his chest. "Better her than Joker." She pulled back. "Hey, want to see some of the other grand Valentine's Day traditions?" Shepard said, looking meaningfully towards the bed.

"Yeah. Definitely."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ...Originally written for Valentine's Day last year. Hahaha, yeah I know. I lost the file and just now found it. I've got bits and pieces of this fic _everywhere_. It's just a matter of finding them.


End file.
